Happy New Year! Welcome to my first blog post!

As you know, we just wrapped up 2021 and we’re kicking off 2022. I’m a huge proponent of self-care and incorporating healthy habits to reduce stress, help protect your mental health, and have a better quality of life. Holidays can be hectic and they often involve giving gifts to others. But what gifts have you given to yourself? And what goals or resolutions have you made for 2022 that relate to self-care? I just started up my own mobile assisted-stretching service, so not only am I passionate about helping people see the benefits of regular stretching, exercise, and how each can be incorporated into your life, these next few blog posts will be related to how stretching can help give YOU the gift of flexibility, mobility, and recovery!

Flexibility vs. Mobility

Before we dive into how stretching can help you, I think it’s helpful to define some terms. Flexibility is an important component of mobility, but they are not the same. Flexibility is the ability of a muscle to be lengthened, and mobility is the ability of a joint to move through the full range of motion. For example, flexibility of the arm is important to be able to reach the top shelf in a cupboard, whereas mobility of the shoulder joint is important to be able to move the arm overhead to reach the item in the cupboard that you need. Staying flexible through stretching exercises can help you maintain or even increase your current range of motion in order to stay mobile throughout your lifespan.

Effects of Inflexibility

Flexibility is the ability of a muscle to be lengthened. The more you stretch, the more elastic and pliable your muscles will become. However, the opposite is also true. According to the Sports Medicine department at UC Davis, muscle tissue can actually shorten over time due to a lack of stretching and/or a lack of use (e.g. a sedentary lifestyle). This shortening of the muscle tissue may create a “tight” feeling, it can cause opposing muscle groups to work harder, may result in exertional fatigue, and this “perfect storm” of issues may eventually lead to muscular injuries.

How Does Stretching Increase Flexibility?

Each muscle and tendon contains proprioceptors that sense stretch, tension, and pressure. First, let’s look at the muscle spindles. The muscle spindles provide mechanosensory information and sense changes in muscle fiber length and tension - so how much and how fast a muscle is lengthened or shortened. As the muscle is stretched or shortened, the muscle spindles are stretched or shortened. Next is the Golgi tendon organ (GTO). The GTO is sensitive to tension and rate of tension and acts as a protective sensory mechanism to inhibit a stretch beyond what it feels is safe. The muscle spindles and the GTO work together to make sure that you can stretch safely by sending pain signals to the brain when they sense that a muscle has stretched too far (McArdle et al., 2015). Therefore, getting in the habit of regular stretching teaches the muscle spindles and the GTO to relax through the stretch as they get accustomed to the new movement. The proprioceptors realize that they are not at risk of injury anymore and this allows you to stretch safely and effectively and eventually get into even deeper stretches as your muscles become more flexible!

Stay tuned for next week’s post about how stretching increases mobility!

References
McArdle, W., Katch, F., & Katch, V., (2015). Exercise Physiology: Nutrition, Energy, and Human Performance (8th ed.). Philadelphia, PA: Wolters Kluwer Health.

UC Davis Health | Sports Medicine. (2021). Flexibility. Retrieved from: https://health.ucdavis.edu/sportsmedicine/resources/flexibility_descriprion.html